If you're an allied health professional..

[Missrabbitisbusy]

What do you like about your role? What do you dislike? Finally, is it family friendly?

I used to be an early years teacher but left the professional 5 years ago and switched to working in a bank. I've had my children and I'm desperate to go back to uni and study for a new career.

I'm leaning towards speech and language as I think it's something I'd be good at and also would enjoy.

Equally I wouldn't rule out radiology or occupational therapy but don't know much about those.

The reason I'm looking at the allied professions is just because of the uni funding that comes with them incase anyone thinks it's a weird question!

Does your local hospital have an Open Day ? Lots of different options.
Some AHPs have assistant roles eg physios , maybe try something like that to see if it's for you ?

Prob worth contacting your local hospital and trying to spend a day (or more)with each AHP department. Talking to the staff and experiencing the job will give you a more realistic idea of what suits you.
Some AHP's (radiography)working patterns can involve 12hour shifts/weekend working/shifts at Christmas/NY so keep that in mind also in relation to a family friendly career.
Best of luck!

I’m an occupational therapist. Been qualified for nearly 2 years and currently on a rotation. I like that i am able to help people in a meaningful way to do the things they need/want to do. It can be very rewarding! The things I do not like is that OTs are not well respected & the role is not clearly understood, that the training does
not prepare you well for the role (it has been a steep learning curve since qualifying). I find it can be really hard to define your role as an OT which I can find disheartening and because the OT role is not well understood there are not as many funded. Everywhere i have worked there have been more physios that OTs! I feel this is because it’s easier to understand their role.

It is however very family friendly especially since COVID-19. I have changed my hours to suit family life, reduced hours and in my current role I am able to work from home and have flexi time. Overall it’s a great job with its challenges, just like any other job.

I’m an OT too. I work in a pathway 2 setting which means that the patient has been discharged from the acute setting and is medically better but still requires ongoing therapy input. I like it because there’s more time to do therapy and get to know the patients better. I think it’s family friendly and a lot of my colleagues work part time (I don’t) There’s a lot of scope for extra training and development. People have this view of OTs that all we do is watch people make cups of tea but there’s a lot more to it. I love the job.

I am an NHS nurse and I love OT's they bring a huge and important dimension to the patient. I am always speaking to our OT for help and advice. I have great respect for them. Fwiw imo I think OT or physio would be great jobs, not so sure about radiography, I just see OT and PT as much more patient facing and certainly on my ward, we have a meeting everyday with them so they are an important part of our team. Although they do work weekends on rotation

Take a look and see what jobs are available locally in each field. That should give you an idea of where the demand is.

What courses are run locally to you?

What are you main areas of interest / skills. Physiotherapy for example is very different from dieticians.

SALT is an excellent field to get Into, but don't forget it also involves swallow assessments etc, it's not just kids and speech.

What qualifications do you have and will they be enough to get into a certain course?